Heart-spotted woodpecker
| Heart-spotted woodpecker | |
|---|---|
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| Male | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Piciformes |
| Family: | Picidae |
| Genus: | Hemicircus |
| Species: | H. canente |
| Binomial name | |
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Hemicircus canente (Lesson, 1830) |
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| Synonyms | |
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Hemicercus cordatus |
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Hemicercus cordatus
The heart-spotted woodpecker (Hemicircus canente) is a species of bird in the woodpecker family. They have a contrasting black and white pattern, a distinctively stubby body with a large wedge-shaped head making them easy to identify while their frequent calling make them easy to detect as they forage for invertebrates under the bark of the slender outer branches of trees. They move about in pairs or small groups and are often found in mixed-species foraging flocks. They have a wide distribution across Asia with populations in the forests of southwestern and central India which are slightly separated from their ranges in the Himalayas and Southeast Asia.
A small, uniquely shaped, black and buff woodpecker with a large crest making the head look large for the short body and tail. Both males and females are predominantly black with heart-shaped black spots on white shoulders with broad white scapular patches and barring of flight feathers. The female has the forehead and crown buffy white while it is black on males. The throat is whitish and the underparts are dark olive grey. A tuft of feathers on the back are specialized and are lipid rich which causes the feathers to stick together in preserved specimens. These special feathers or "fat quills" sometimes make the rump feathers appear buff and may be a form of "cosmetic colouration" and the secretion is said to have a pleasant smell but the functional significance is unknown.
Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests. They are found in the Himalayan forests of India, Bangladesh and extend into Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. Within India, they are also found in the Western Ghats and the forests of central India. A subspecies cordatus based on the description by Thomas C. Jerdon from a specimen from the Western Ghats is not considered distinct and the populations differ slightly in plumage colour and vary clinally in size (the northern birds being larger than those closer to the equator).
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Wikipedia